


Oracles Are Fickle Creatures

by theandrogynousdragon



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Angry Merlin (Merlin), Angst and Tragedy, Balinor Lives (Merlin), Balinor mention, Canonical Character Death, Character Death, Dark Merlin (Merlin), Gen, Genocide, Hurt Merlin (Merlin), Hurt No Comfort, I'm Sorry, Kid Merlin (Merlin), Kinda, Major Character Undeath, Mild Gore, Minor Original Character(s), Non-Linear Narrative, POV Second Person, Protective Merlin, Sweet Merlin (Merlin), Time Loop, after a few tries, hope can be a bad thing, hope is deadly, kilgharrah had a family, kilgharrah's dragon family, prophecies are weird that way, prophecies require belief
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-07-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:13:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25587262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theandrogynousdragon/pseuds/theandrogynousdragon
Summary: You know of the Purge before it happens. This changes nothing, except it does.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 38





	Oracles Are Fickle Creatures

**Author's Note:**

> Enjoy this stream of consciousness fic. I apologize in advance for any tears that may occur.

“Harken, my children,” your mother whispers, smoke curling from her lips. “Harken.” And you do, because you are her son, how could you not? “I will tell you the story of the Eggbreaker, the Usurper, the Honorless.” Your mother's scales—red as the pretty stones your sister likes digging up to play with—shift as she nudges your brothers to pay attention. “This is a story that hasn't happened yet, and will not for a very long time. But it is something you need to know, my children.” She speaks of a man who will conquer a kingdom and erase magic from it with wrathful fire. “A bloodprice,” your mother hums, “for his wife, who will breathe her last as her golden son takes his first breath.”

“This man will slaughter as many of us as he can. He will try to eradicate us, and our heartbrothers. He will wear a cloak of blood with dragon scales over the heart. His name, my children, is Uthyr Pen-draig. Kill him, for our yet unborn sons and daughters and heartbrothers. Do not let him succeed.”

* * *

You try, you try, you try. You fail, and are reduced to screaming your rage in the dark, chains thick around your limbs. You had not worried about your mother. (She was a prophetess, a queen, and yet her heart was kind beneath those gem-hard scales. It was that kindness that led to her blood, thick and warm, soaking the stones.) You had not worried about your sister. (She had been the color of the sky, and who could chain the skies? They had not bothered trying, had shot her down like a common dove. They had not afforded her the dignity of dying in battle.) You had not worried for your brothers. (Born of the same egg, a rarity, both with skin of shining steel. Such bright scales had not been the blessing your mother had thought, in the end.)

You had not worried for your mate. (She had been so cunning, so beautiful, so terrible in her anger. So very dead, after. And you had been too stunned to resist the chains snapping closed around your claws.)

You had worried for your eggs, that is true, but you had never imagined you would see them smashed upon the stone, six budding souls abruptly snuffed out.

You had not worried for your heartbrother. (He had been a shrewd man, had managed to escape Uther's fires. You feel him die, years later, and it is like someone has hollowed your chest yet another time.)

You cling to prophecy because it is all you have left now.

* * *

And then you See a visitor one day. A boy. _Kin_ , your soul whispers, _My kin, brother of my heart_.

_The very last_ , something else mourns.

You call to him when he arrives, desperate for anyone to talk to. He comes tripping down the steps, a bright-eyed fledgling child.

“How small you are,” you tell him, “for such a great destiny.” It is a lie, but a partial and comforting one. Prophecies need belief to come to pass, after all. You do not know yet just how badly you have miscalculated. Prophecies need _belief_ , and somewhere between this soft-clawed fledgling and the vicious snarling adult he will become, the boy loses hope in the prophecy about magic returning. Arthur is his friend, and your kin does not want his friend to die.

You forgot that, for all your kin's power, he is still a man. Still kind, despite everything. You are forced to watch the boy's heart break over and over as he hastily scrabbles to shove the pieces back together.

* * *

He holds his friend-king's corpse, screaming at you, begging for some other end to this.

It will not be long now until you see your bloodfamily again. So you lie, one more time, feeling the weight of your years settle on your bones. This is not a comforting lie. You give him _hope_ , and you feel sick, disgusted with yourself as you watch him cradle that tiny, fragile thing to his chest. Hope, you know, is deadly, and what will it do to a man who cannot die? You are almost glad your life is fading, so you do not have to see those eyes turn dead and cold like all things hope touches.

“Arthur will rise again, when Albion's need is greatest,” you murmur. _Ancestors forgive me, but I cannot tell him the truth._

The truth is this: Arthur will not rise as long as Merlin lives, because the power in his veins is enough that Albion will never reach it's greatest need.

The truth is this, also, but you do not know it yet: after the earth has died and humanity has fled to the stars, Merlin will take time itself in his hands and tear it apart in screaming rage until he finds his homeland again.

* * *

“How small you are,” you start to say to the curiously dead-eyed sharp-toothed fledgling child, and choke on the ice crawling out of your mouth to coat your bronze scales. The last thing you see are golden eyes that hold no warmth, and you feel a strange sense of regret for something that hasn't happened. _I should have told him the truth_ , you think, gasping for air that will not come. But you cannot place the lie. 

* * *

“Harken, my children,” your mother says, sparks sliding off her tongue. You do. You will get it _right_ this time, you swear it. The boy deserves that much, at least. _What boy?,_ you wonder. You do not know. 

* * *

“Hello, Emrys,” you greet the wide-eyed fledgling standing beside his proud father. “We have much to talk about.”

The boy smiles knowingly, his eyes soft gold, a few of his teeth already dragon-sharp. “So we do.” 


End file.
